


Optimus Princeps

by byzantienne



Category: Hetalia: Axis Powers
Genre: Drama, Gen, Historical
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2009-01-21
Updated: 2009-01-21
Packaged: 2017-10-03 11:34:48
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,191
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/17572
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/byzantienne/pseuds/byzantienne
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>This is what imperium implies: his right to extend his protection over all supplicant peoples, and his right to refuse them other forms of governance. Rome and Germania, the Dacian Campaigns.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Optimus Princeps

**Author's Note:**

> Warnings for actualized imperialism and interpersonal violence.

**DIES LUNAE A.D. XV KAL. NOV. DCCCLIV (854) A.U.C. -- Tapae, Dacia**

Eleven regimented _castra_ bristle the forests outside of Tapae, arrayed in a flared, curved line, half of a catenary arch, each _via praetoria_ pointed straight at the heart of the massed Dacian forces like a brace of _gladii_. The evening is early, made earlier with heavy clouds rolling down the Transylvanian Alps, a thick grey that envelops the tops of trees and tracks the smell of wet pine even into the heart of the camp, sets the heavy legionary standards to flapping on their posts.

Everything else is scented with iron. Rome breathes it in, old iron in blood and boot-nails, new iron in just-forged swords still ringing from the smithery. He pulls his cloak around his shoulders, fastens it with a golden eagle, the talons grasping the red cloth and holding it fast. The wind catches it as he sets off, straight down the central road of the centermost _castra_, the road the _Ulpia Victrix_, thirtieth and newest of legions, will take at dawn.

The rain comes down on him as he enters the forest. It is a very paltry defense against boiled boots and clear eyes, and Rome is not deterred. His excursion is necessary, the rightful action of an _imperator_ surveying the ground his soldiers will soon tamp down with the noise of their marching. A true general lays down his groundwork before the battle begins; knows the shape and breadth of the land he fights on before he fights there.

By now, Rome knows Germania very well indeed. Even out in both their hinterlands, these pine forests rilled through with the Danube and the impossible dreams of the Dacian king -- where _did_ Germania dig up Decebalus, Rome wonders, and not for the first time -- even here, Rome sees Germania's designs, his refusals to give himself over, his Battle of Adamclisi just another repetition of Gergovia, with only the Caesars interchanged, successor for original. Trajan is no Julius, in the field -- but Rome finds him more than sufficient. He understands why the legions must be gathered here, in Dacia, in winter.

Why Rome must go out, in full dark now, into the center of the encampment of his enemies.

Rome's cloak beats against his bare knees, whipped heavy by the strength of the wind. The rain has plastered his hair to his forehead in slick curls, runs in rivulets down the pommel of his _gladius_, drips from his knuckles as he pushes the oiled-leather flap of Germania's tent open. It is dry inside, dry but not warm -- the leather doesn't keep out the chill, and Germania has neglected to light a proper hearth -- the only light is a covered lamp, the crude scent of burning fat. Germania is not shivering, even when he looks up at Rome from his seat by the lamp, not shivering and with his lips curled away from his teeth, pulling wider when he recognizes his visitor. Rome does not wait to be invited in.

"Salve, Germania," he says.

"_Salve, pater tuae patriae, optimus princeps infeliciter,_" says Germania through that bared-teeth smile. His accent roughens the words less each time Rome meets him. The way his mouth moves is almost perfect mimicry of Rome's. He does not get up. And neither does he go down onto the packed dirt of the ground and press his forehead between outstretched and supplicant hands, and thus even accentless Latin is insufficient.

And there is the matter of that _infeliciter_, unluckily, unwelcomed --

His hand fists in the long blond strands of Germania's hair, wrenches him so their eyes meet, does all this without straining. Despite this, _through_ this, Germania's gaze is not surprised and his pupils refuse to widen with fear. Rome smiles down at him, blocks out the light with the bulk of his chest.

"You should command your Decebalus to sue for peace," he says.

Germania laughs, the noise strangled in the angle of his neck. "Decebalus would say that we sued for peace with Domitian, and what did that get us? _Pax Domitiani_."

That is clever. Rome chuckles, tightens his fingers, _pulls_.

"-- which was never enough peace for _you_, Rome --"

Insolence is too natural on that face. "The _Pax Romana_," he says, releasing Germania's hair in favor of taking his shoulders in both hands, leaning down, watching the hollows under Germania's cheekbones fill up with flickering shadows, "is extended to all peoples who willingly give themselves over to the protection and leadership of the queen of cities and her glorious emperor. To her _imperium_, Germania. You have been offered it many times now."

Germania does not turn up his throat. "You have demanded I accept it. That is not at all the same thing."

He can still feel disappointment, even after centuries, the same battles fought in Gaul, in Hibernia, the same offer made. "And you have refused my friendship and my guidance n favor of propping up your chieftains, of wandering cityless in your forests, of dying on the points of my _gladii_, in favor of _wallowing_ in your _barbarism._"

"What," Germania says, lightly, nothing in his voice at all of awe or shame, "would you have me give up my people's ways and manners? Perhaps I should find some young man, some young king, tell him to unite his people, regiment them with arms, found a city and line its streets with marble --"

The _temerity_ of that comparison. Decebalus is no _imperator_, no Jupiter on Earth --

"--give them some reason to be proud of what they are, even in the face of their powerful neighbors -- quite like your precious Octavian Augustus, my Decebalus --"

The sound of Rome's hand across Germania's mouth is sharper than the thunder outside. His knuckles come away bloody from Germania's teeth, oozing darkly. Germania snarls, daubs rapidly at his lip with his tongue.

Rome lets the blood drip onto the dirt.

"Now you see why I am here," he says.

"To strike down anyone who will not go on his knees for you?" Germania is laughing, his eyes bright above the red on his mouth, and he _is_ shaking now, tremors like distant earthquakes in his wrists and throat, as if he cannot master himself entirely.

Which he cannot. It is beyond his capabilities.

"Sue for peace, Germania," Rome tells him, _commands_ him. "Accept a provincial governor of my choosing and Sarmizegetusa will be a city as great as Athens, as great as Alexandria."

Germania shakes his head. He has still not looked away.

"Sue for peace and you will not see your people slaughtered at dawn."

Rome is magnanimous. He holds out one hand, like Jove himself reaching down from Olympus to catch at the soul of a dead emperor. Germania stares at that hand -- measures it with his eyes --

"--if I believed you," he breathes. "Oh, I would."

Rome shoves him from his chair to the floor. He crumples, and grins up at him, and clutches at his own sleeves so as not to reach out for help --

\-- has not climbed back to his feet when Rome goes out again into the rain.

\---  
.

**Author's Note:**

> At the beginning of the second century of the Common Era, the Roman legions under the command of the emperor Trajan fought two long campaigns in what would become the Roman province of Dacia. Trajan and his forces defeated the Dacian king Decebalus, at the [Battle of Tapae in 101 CE](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Second_Battle_of_Tapae), the only foreign king to have successfully negotiated two periods of peace with the Empire


End file.
